Ephemeral
by pharo
Summary: Her dreams resemble nothing of reality.


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Ephemeral

Author: Pharo

Disclaimer: 'Alias' belongs to ABC, Bad Robot, and JJ Abrams.

Summary: Her dreams resemble nothing of reality.

Spoilers: "Almost Thirty Years."

Feedback: pharo@newyork.com

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'on sleepless roads, the sleepless go…' – Jimmy Eat World, _'Hear You Me'_

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.dreams.

In her dreams, she is able to reach him before he disappears behind a dimming exit sign. She is able to save him from himself – his self-righteous crusade to put everyone's welfare above his own, masking an inability to allow himself to be happy.

In her dreams, he doesn't say goodbye. Instead, the collision between the metal fire extinguisher and checkered window produce a greater impact than the reverberating clang traveling down the hall. There are shards of glass, jagged edges of hasty imperfection that she doesn't give a second thought about. She thrusts her arm in while the blue liquid pours out like an alien waterfall.

His fingertips touch hers and she pulls him out, the warmth of her hand diffusing into his palm. She brings life into him and waits until he smiles, gratitude shining in his eyes.

"You're ok," she whispers over and over again in his ear, her voice trembling with relief.

"Thank you," he replies. His breathing is irregular – a soft wheeze against her neck, a symphony to her ears. He is alive and that's all that matters to her.

She pulls him to his feet, urging him to walk it off as if his near-death experience was nothing more than a muscle cramp.

"You scared me," she admits as they walk down the hall to the safety waiting outside.

"I was pretty afraid myself."

"Maybe you should lay off the daredevil stunts," she suggests.

He stops and grins.

"Well, I'm an adventurous guy."

"Try it again and I'll break your finger."

He laughs.

"I try it again and you won't have to break my finger."

"All that matters now is that everything is fine now," she says seriously.

In her dreams, she speaks the truth.

****

.reality.

There is a curt wave before he fades behind the swirls of blue. He collapses onto himself. He bangs on the Plexiglas window while struggling to remember underwater survival skills from a training video viewed in an empty conference room on a Sunday afternoon three months ago.

The extraction team pulls her away from the door. They seat her in the back of a black van, radio to the central agency that they recovered one of two, and fiercely drive away. She repeatedly yells for them to turn back. She tells them that they can't leave him behind while they keep assuring her that they will go back when it's safe. 

They know that it will never be safe. She knows it's a lie because the CIA never looks back. Her fingers touch the cool glass of the van and try to imagine some way that he could've made the narrow window of escape, and gotten away.

The team calls Jack Bristow to inform him of what has transpired in the last four hours. He makes the trip back from LA to escort her home. She spends the whole trip in silence, clutching onto her father's hand like a tethered lifeline. 

At headquarters, they give her a couple of days off to gather her thoughts. They want her to be collected when she comes back to work. Her father offers to drive her home and she accepts, knowing that he won't push her to answer any questions or figure anything out.

"Is Will ok?" she asks, the first words out of her mouth in the past twenty-eight hours.

"He'll be fine," he says. She takes this to mean that he isn't fine at the moment.

"I need to make sure he's—"

"I'll take care of it."

She nods, knowing that she should help her best friend get through it. She is the reason for all this and it is her responsibility to deal with the repercussions, but she doesn't know how much help she would be to him. She is breaking apart at the seams and she is sure that Will doesn't need her weakness to contend with.

"Promise me that you'll help him through this, Dad?"

"You have my word."

She thanks him for his help when they reach her porch. He follows her inside and whispers something to Francie before leaving. She hopes it's a warning to Francie to stay away from her, but she doubts those were his words of wisdom. Her best friend brings her soup to help her feel better.

She only wishes soup could make it all go away.

They tell her that she can't go to the funeral. It is too dangerous, a greater risk than is necessary. It is not safe for her, they rationalize. Vaughn would have wanted her to be safe, they explain. If anyone from SD-6 were to learn of her affiliation with the CIA, she would be six feet under just like him and what possible good would that serve?

She knows that they are right. She is selfish for wanting to jeopardize the entire mission because of her feelings for him, but she doesn't care for logic at the time. She wants to hand in her resignation, storm out of the building, and take her chances with SD-6's security section, but her job is bigger than these notions of liberation.

They tell her that the absolute and final answer is a resounding no and there will be no compromise on the matter.

"You're not a part of the life he had outside the confines of this building, Agent Bristow."

She promises to herself that she will not let the tears fall. It is not so much that they can say it so easily, but the fact that what they tell her is the truth. She doesn't fit in his scene, is not a character in the life he molded out of lies and excuses. 

She watches the funeral processions from a parked car. She has sent flowers, another among the numerous anonymous batches.

She watches the stoic mother, having gone through the same motions a lifetime ago. Two men in suits tell her how great her son was and hand her a wooden box that is supposed to serve as a substitute for his presence. 

The red-eyed girlfriend tries to remain composed, but the tears wrack her body. There is so much the girlfriend wants to say, months of apologies she didn't get around to and now it's too late. She leans against the best friend that struggles to remain intact. He looks like he is about to break, glancing around, avoiding everyone's eyes. His eyes scan the crowd and for a second, she is sure that he sees her. His glance lingers longer than they should and she knows that she has been caught. The shock is a brutal reminder that she doesn't belong, that she never did. Not in his life.

The only place she has with him is in her dreams. The dreams where they can walk out of a building together or look at each other without pretending as if it's the first time they met.

The dreams where she is able to save him before he fades away.


End file.
